West Texas Intermediate (WTI) has been trading between $60-70 a barrel since late December. However, Western Canadian Select (WCS) has been trading at a discount to WTI and exporting Alberta oil is proving difficult as pipeline approvals are delayed. This has slowed the growth potential for Calgary’s energy based economy

We are predicting that the bottom of the commercial market will be in sometime this year. With that being said the market has experienced a flight to quality space. Top quality pockets of 5,000 sq. ft. or less are being quickly leased in the current market.

What does this mean to the office user? If you intend to take advantage of the renter’s commercial market right now, this next 12-18 months may be the most opportune time to look for savings in your rental expense or that chance to upgrade to A quality space at rents tenant’s paid for C space in 2014 at 6% vacancy. The window is wide open now but maybe closing soon.

Calgary commercial realty company Bedrock Realty was recently featured in the May 2017 issue of Business in Calgary magazine. Below is the article, or see it for yourself in the online version of the magazine here.

A recession like the one Alberta has experienced over the past few years can devastate industries, communities, and corporations. It’s important to have advisors who understand the cycle and can help clients weather the storm. John Savard of Bedrock Realty Advisors is one of those resources.

“I’ve seen a few different markets going from a balanced market to an extreme landlord’s market to a tenant’s market and back again. Now we’re fully in a tenant’s market,” he says.

That’s great news for Savard’s clients. He specializes exclusively in tenant transactions, eliminating the conflict of interest some competitors encounter when representing both sides of the coin.

“We believe we can only serve one master. We feel we can offer the best services to our local tenant clients because we don’t have anyone else’s interests at heart,” he says.

With the downtown vacancy rate sitting at around 25 percent, there is an immense amount of office space available and tenants have their pick. Savard uses his expertise and experience to ensure clients are getting the best deal possible regardless of what they need.

His clients fall into one of three categories: those seeking lease renewals, those looking for a new space or those subleasing. And in a recession market, early renewals are a great way to help clients improve their own bottom line.

“You don’t want to waste the opportunity that exists in a recession,” he says. “Now is a time to create significant value for your company by getting a much lower lease rate.”

Savard and his team at Bedrock have been successful in helping clients negotiate early lease renewals with landlords. By blending their current, likely higher, lease rates with ones more indicative of today’s market, clients enjoy an immediate reducction on in their real estate costs while landlords keep tenants in their buildings for an extended term. While rates will likely rise in the near future, the low rates are a great opportunity for Bedrock Realty’s clients today.

Over the past 14 years, John Savard has helped hundreds of tenants negotiate their perfect commercial space, establishing him as one of the top performing commercial brokers in the field. And as Calgary climbs out of this recession and grows stronger, thanks to his guidance and expertise, Savard’s clients will be stronger too.

Are you looking for that perfect office space? Check out our free Office Locator Tool to help guide you through the process quickly and easily!

Commercial real estate felt the pinch of a slumping economy in 2016 and Calgary’s suburban office market was no exception.

From headleases – between a landlord and a tenant – to subleases – where a tenant puts some of their excess space on the market – commercial real estate outside the core had its challenges.

“A significant amount of very, very large blocks of vacancies are available on the sublease market and the headlease market, for that matter, and we have not seen a great number of tenants going in to take those spaces,’’ said John Savard, principal, office leasing specialist with Bedrock Realty Advisors Inc. Suburban office vacancy rose 0.3 per cent during the fourth quarter of 2016 to 22.6 per cent, according to a recent Barclay Street Real Estate report.

As featured in the Calgary Herald this week, Bedrock Realty had the pleasure of helping B&A Planning Group take advantage of the current market and relocate their offices to an entire floor of the prestigious west tower of Penn West Plaza.

Bedrock Realty was featured in the July 15 edition of the Calgary Herald’s Business section and the Financial Post. Click to download the PDF.

The Bedrock Realty Advisors team is thrilled to be featured in today’s edition of the Calgary Herald’s Business section and the Financial Post!

The Herald’s David Parker wrote the article, and we just want to give him a big thank you for taking the time to learn about us and feature us in the paper. We are very excited to be a part of Calgary’s office real estate industry and we look forward to continuing to help our clients get the office space they need at the price they deserve!

We are very excited to announce the launch of Bedrock Realty Advisors, Calgary’s newest real estate brokerage specializing in downtown commercial and office space.

“I’m very excited to be able to bring my expertise and knowledge of Calgary’s downtown commercial real estate to this new venture,” says Bedrock’s owner John Savard.

While Bedrock may be new to the Calgary downtown commercial real estate scene, Savard is not – in fact, Savard has been a steady presence in the industry since 1989 when he made the move from Toronto to Calgary.

Since then Savard has worked at numerous commercial brokerages, representing hundreds of clients internationally in their office leasing deals.

“Unlike other brokerages who represent the tenant and the landlord, we represent the tenant only,” says Savard. “We work hard to get them the right space to meet their needs and at a fair price.”

Commercial Lease Calgary - Office Space Rental ON

What Our Clients Are Saying

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for helping us secure our new office premises. Your professional expertise and attention to detail made finding new office space a pleasurable experience.

Your understanding of the landlord’s lease and what the landlord’s giving points were helped our firm secure very favourable lease terms. We are confident that you represented our firm’s best interest throughout the entire process.

Your knowledge of the office market saved us money! The recommendation of asking for a free rent period directly helped our firm save a significant amount of money to off-set our moving costs.

Without hesitation, I would recommend your leasing services to my clients, friends and business associates.

Robert B. Ramsay

President, Vantage Engineering Inc.

ACM Automation used John Savard’s services for our office lease renewals in 2003 & 2008. In both negotiations, we did not want to move and were concerned that our landlord would use that against us. John was able to present market comparable alternatives to the landlord so the landlord now had to compete against its competition to earn our tenancy. I strongly feel that John’s involvement created the leverage that ACM Automation required to secure ACM favourable lease terms.

In the fall of 2011, ACM Automation needed to expand our business. A simple solution presented itself as there was vacant space in our building. Expansion in our building seemed easy as we still had 2 years left on the lease that John had negotiated 3 years prior. We thought we had a solution figured out in our direct discussions with our landlord’s agent but I called my trusted real estate broker for his opinion. John advised us on the office market. It seemed to be a reasonable solution to expand in our building given the limited recoveries that we could achieve in the current Sublease market that would make a move too costly.

Trish Bingam

Owner, ACM Facility Safety

John has been my office space advisor for over 7 years now. His initial role was vital in relocating to our previous location 5 years ago.

In our most recent relocation, our company growth plans crated uncertainty over just how much more office space we would require and therefore crated a delay in our ability to make a timely decision. This delay challenged our search choices such that only a few options existed.

Our search parameters were also limited by location. Our firm’s business requires our location to be close to both City Hall and major transportation arteries such as the Memorial Drive and Deerfoot Trail. John was able to increase the set of office location options by recommending a building in the west end of downtown. I trusted johns’ knowledge of our new building’s ingress and egress of traffic. I have since discovered that John’s recommendation has saved our firm a significant amount of travel time.

John successfully navigated our limited choices and was able to successfully negotiate a very favourable lease for our firm in a location that has turned out better than I would have thought. John’s knowledge of the Landlord’s Lease revealed the giving points that provided us the comfort of a lease that would protect our firm.

Without Hesitation, I would recommend John Savard’s office leasing services to my friends and colleagues.

Greg Brown

Brown & Associates Planning Group

John has been our trusted source for the last twelve years, and our last three office locations. He is incredibly knowledgeable and helped us get a prime location that exceeded our expectations.

John takes the pain out of an office move, without a doubt I would recommend working with BedRock Realty.